Stringed musical instruments such as electric guitars by their very nature are bulky and difficult to transport. Indeed, during transportation or storage such guitars are commonly placed in hardened cases which due to their function requires them to be larger than the instrument they carry thereby exacerbating transportation and storage problems. The combined weight of the instrument and the case is also a disincentive for musicians to carry their guitar with them while travelling.
When travelling by aircraft or other modes of transportation such as road coach, musicians are often forced to check in their guitars as part of their luggage as it is usually not allowable for them to be carried on board the aircraft or coach with the musician. The need to check in guitars at airports also generally means that the instrument is counted as part of the weight allowance for the musicians luggage and indeed, may require the musician to pay excess luggage costs if the weight allowance is exceeded as a result. The collection of instruments at luggage carousels at the relevant destination is also time consuming and bothersome.
The bulkiness and weight of conventional guitars provides a particular problem for backpackers and like persons that generally travel with minimal luggage forcing many to leave their guitar behind as it is just too great a burden to take it with them. However, musicians commonly wish to have their guitars handy when travelling should the opportunity to play with other musicians arise or simply, so that they can play and work on any new tunes that may come to mind.
There is, therefore, a need for compact stringed musical instruments that are able to be readily transported and stored but which in use, can be handled in the same manner as conventionally known instruments.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,770,079 discloses a stringed instrument provided with a plurality of legs arranged on a rear face of the instrument's body. Each of the legs has a foot and is swingable outwardly from the body to provide support for the user. However, the body of the instrument is quite bulky due to the nature of the legs and their location. The legs are also unwieldy and visually, are not appealing.
In addition, as the positioning of the feet of the legs is variable it is necessary for each of the legs to be individually arranged in the desired position each time the instrument is to be used. Legs spaced apart from each other along the instrument also needs to be separately fixed in their desired positions. As such, the arrangement is also cumbersome and annoying to use.